


Where the Lovelight Glows

by petpluto



Category: Veronica Mars (TV), Veronica Mars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Christmas Fluff, F/M, Friendship, POV Female Character, Romance, Teacher AU, Veronica Mars Holiday Gift Exchange 2014
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-22
Updated: 2014-12-22
Packaged: 2018-03-02 20:24:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,047
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2825036
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/petpluto/pseuds/petpluto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Veronica is pretty sure she's going to hate chaperoning the class trip to Washington DC. Especially since Logan Echolls is one of her co-chaperones.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Where the Lovelight Glows

**Author's Note:**

  * For [StarlightAfterAStorm](https://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightAfterAStorm/gifts).



> Veronica Mars is not mine. This[Veronica Mars fic exchange is not my idea.](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Veronica_Mars_Holiday_Gift_Exchange/profile) That's all [ StarlightAfterAStorm](http://archiveofourown.org/users/StarlightAfterAStorm)
> 
> And this fic benefitted massively from[ ghostcat](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Ghostcat/pseuds/Ghostcat), who calmed me down and helped me figure out this world. And then beta'd the result.

The Neptune High teacher’s lounge is chronically empty, and smells like a combination of stale coffee from the last person who made a pot and forgot about it, and rotting foodstuffs potentially that same person left behind in the fridge. Veronica likes the place enough for the first attribute that she can tolerate the second. It’s where she typically spends her mornings, her free periods, and, sometimes, the “mandatory” pep rallies.

It comes as no surprise to her that Wallace has figured out where she squirrels herself away when she isn’t with him, even though his presence in the room itself is a little startling. She would have bet good money that he either didn’t realize Neptune High had a teacher’s lounge, or that he was the original coffee making offender and would stay far away for as long a time possible.

She watches him out of the corner of her eye as he walks carefully toward her, and turns her full attention to her paper when it becomes clear to her that something is amiss. She’s always been good at burying her head in the sand. It’s part of how she ended up here, after all. So she plays ostrich. For as long as she can.

“Hey…” Wallace begins, sliding in across from her, “I have a favor to ask.”

“No,” she answers, not looking up from the paper in front of her.

“You don’t even know what I’m going to ask you yet.”

She sighs, concentrating even more on the dangling participle in front of her. Swirls her red pen around the offending section, moves on. “I know that I don’t want to do it, whatever it is, when you sound like you did when you had to explain to Alicia why that goat was in the guest house.”

“The goat was in the guest house,” Wallace erupts, “because you neglected your goat watching duties in order to-”

“Pick up an extra shift at The Hut when you failed to pay me the promised 40 bucks?” she finishes, glancing up at her step-brother and raising her eyebrow.

He raises his in return. “How about this- the goat incident was when we were 17 years old, and now that we’re older and wiser, I think it’s best that we concentrate on the here and the now. And in the here and the now, I would tell you that I got you this job and that you owe me, and that I need a favor.”

“You didn’t get me this job-”

“I got you-”

“You got me the opportunity to get this job, which I told you I was grateful for-”

“And I’m calling in your debt,” Wallace concludes triumphantly. Veronica feels her jaw swing open. “Hey, it’s not my fault you taught me about debts and debt collecting from a young, impressionable age.”

“No, but it is your fault you’re such a good student.” He grins at her, and she grins back. “Alright. Tell me what the favor is.”

It concerns her, the way Wallace shifted in his chair. And it concerns her more when he glances away and keeps his gaze firmly planted outside the window. “You know that school trip to Washington DC?”

“No,” she spits out. “No. No no no no no. No.”

She watches the rueful smile start to peak out. “I hate to do this, sis, I do, but -”

“No.”

“Okay, so, before you say no,” Wallace starts, before Veronica cuts him off again.

“I’ve already said no.”

“Before you say no, I want you to hear me out.”

“Fine.”

Wallace nods, and leans back again. “I kind of like the new computer teacher.”

“Mac? You like Mac?”

Wallace shrugs. “Yeah. And I found out that she’s into this band, and I bought the tickets. And I asked her to go with me. And then I remembered about the school trip. So, I need a favor.”

Veronica sighs again. “Okay. You’ve twisted my arm. I’ll take Mac on the date.”

“Veronica.”

“Hey, I know, I know. Mac’s expecting the moderately successful JV coach of Neptune High and she gets stuck with little old me, but I promise. I will treat her right. I will take her out in style.”

“I need you to chaperone the trip for me.”

“I can’t go. You’re going because of the air and space museum and how that fits in with your class’s assignments. I have no knowledge of air. Or space. I would not be a good fit for this at all. This is your thing.”

“You know that it’s more about bodies being there than anything else,” Wallace argues and she stares at him wide-eyed.

“But-”

“Vee, we’ve been through a lot over the years. And I’m always there for you. Always. Can you have my back on this? Please?”

Out of all the things she should never have taught Wallace, Veronica thinks to herself, it’s the puppy dog eyes that take the top spot. 

“You really like Mac, huh?” she floats, and a soft smile flits across his face. 

He bites his lip, like he used to do in high school - when they were high schoolers, she corrects herself, because they’re still in high school now - and she melts. “Yeah. Yeah, I really do. So?”

“So, who do we have to talk to around here to get some paperwork corrected?” she asks. The hug he envelops her in almost makes her think the whole thing is worth it.

~~~

The whole thing is not worth it. She shivers, and winces as the cold seeps through her coat. She now has a list of people to reign retribution down on, starting with Wallace but definitely including whichever school official thought December was the appropriate time to send people from SoCal to Washington DC. Where it snows, apparently frequently and with gusto. And where there are potholes filled with slush. Which she has been woefully incapable of avoiding.

“Son of a bitch,” she grinds out as her boot finds its way into another puddle, water sloshing over the top.

One of the other teachers wrangling the students toward the Hard Rock Cafe dinner is book at slows, and shakes his head disapprovingly.

“Ms. Mars,” he scolds gleefully, “such language to use around little ears. Tisk. Tisk.”

She glowers and he grins at her as he marches ahead, leaving her to miserably bring up the rear. Logan Echolls. Another person on her list. The person making it so that she wishes she’d checked the sheet of other ‘volunteers’ before letting Wallace guilt her into this trip.

Logan Echolls, who’d been rubbing her the wrong way ever since she’d landed her job at Neptune High. Logan Echolls, who’d smirked and smarmed and generally annoyed the shit out of her and who’d dialled up all those tendencies on this trip, specifically.

She’d complained about him and his presence (and the food, and the transportation, and her lack of seasonally appropriate wardrobe) to Wallace that first night. This was a problem, because she hadn’t realized her roommate had brought him back to the room after she’d gone down to the hotel lobby for some “socializing”. She’d even felt embarrassed and a smidge contrite for half a second when she realized they were there. Before Echolls had leered at her and promised to loosen her up as he dangled a flask from his fingertips.

She hadn’t fled the room, but she hadn’t exactly stayed around to chat, either. She’d ended up down in the lobby herself, with the shop teacher who had the misfortune of being Echolls’ roommate. They’d groused about their lousy roommate luck as they covertly drank their rum and cokes before teetering off to bed.

She growls, glaring at the back of his head as he practically pirouettes toward the door of the restaurant. One of the girls to her left sighs deeply. “Oh my god,” she draws out, and Veronica is ready to nod in agreement. “He is so great. What class does he teach?”

Her friend looks just as smitten. “He’s one of the history teachers, can you believe it? Who knew I could like history?”

She glowers at the folly of teenage girls, and pushes past them into the relative warmth of the building.

~~~

It isn’t that she hates Logan Echolls, she texts to Wallace as she watches him waltz a student in front of the exhibit featuring costumes from Singin’ in the Rain. She glares at his return text of “sure you don’t”. She doesn’t. She can admit that he’s charismatic. That he seems to love teaching. That the students clamoring to take his classes aren’t just doing it because he’s attractive and flirtatious and, well, the offspring of famous people.

She just doesn’t like him very much, she thinks as she tries to control her own posse of sugared up teens as they run from exhibit to exhibit.

“Guys, no,” she tries, to no avail. The person who designated which kids to which adult must hate her as much as she now hates them, because she swears her group is filled with the students who have given her the most trouble throughout her year and a half at Neptune. Her feeble attempts to corral them have come up empty and her face starts to burn as she watches the chaos unfold.

Logan looks up from his group, having their rapt attention, and she cringes at him noticing her helplessness. His eyes narrow and mouth grows tight as he watches her group’s behavior. If there’s one thing she doesn’t want, it’s to hear his inevitable smartass remark.

“Hey, you guys!” he bellows. “Get it together!”

Her kids slow down, muttering and whispering sorry’s. He winks at her as their groups jostle in their haste to get to the next exhibit. 

“Don’t worry, Mars,” he murmurs. “Not everyone can command a room.”

She hates him.

~~~

A smart phone gets shoved in her hands by one of the kids, shouts of, “Take my picture, M!” ringing out. So, she does.

Doesn’t even think about it. Just lines up the shot, and then directs the kid a little farther to the right, to catch the light. Snaps the picture, and hands the phone back.

One of the girls looks at the picture and thrusts her phone in Veronica’s direction. “Take mine, too! Take mine too!” 

Before she can blink, she has a dozen kids’ phones. They’re all posing together, grinning and pushing each other. Sticking their tongues out. She laughs, and shifts to the next phone.

~~~

She pulls out her camera one night, during the magical 3 hour window after the mandatory crap is done and before the designated time for all the kids to be in their own rooms. The weight is familiar, comforting, and she allows herself to forget why she put it away in the first place.

Wandering down to the lobby in her new and appallingly expensive winter coat and boots, she brings the camera up. Snaps a couple of shots.

Pauses to look at her work. Logan Echolls, gazing maudlinly into the hotel’s fake fireplace. 

Veronica doesn’t delete it.

She encounters some of her students on the streets, their cries of “M! M!” drawing her attention. She lifts the camera and shoots some pictures of them as well.

She plugs the camera into her laptop later, uploads some of the shots of the city she’s taken. Signs on to the hotel’s painfully slow wifi and puts a few of them on Wallace’s wall with the message, “DC misses you”, and the messenger blinks to life.

“You taking pictures?”

“Every girl’s gotta have a hobby,” she types back.

The words “good to know” appear almost instantaneously. Then, “Neptune misses you, too”.

She never thought she’d be homesick for Neptune, she thinks as she sends the pictures she’d taken of the students to their school email addresses. But life has a way of surprising her like that.

~~~

Her pictures, with her real camera, are a big hit with the kids. They become a certain kind of currency. She bribes her crew to stay relatively well behaved and within sight; and in return, she makes them her regular models with the promise to send them the pictures once they return to their rooms at the end of the night.

It’s not as flashy as dancing or superfluous dramatics, and it’s probably not as accepted in academic circles as the respect Mr. Navarro commands from his group, but she gets by. 

She catches Logan’s eye as she snaps a few shots of him with his group, and he raises an eyebrow at her. She resists the urge to stick her tongue out at him, and turns away.

Veronica sends Wallace pictures, too, and tries to gather intel about his date. He remains closed-lipped, and Alicia also doesn’t give anything up when she calls home. Her only consolation is that her father seems as much in the dark, and as irritated by it, as she is.

“Only two more days, honey,” he tells her. “Only two more days. We’ll pick you up from the airport, and we’ll hit them hard for information then.”

“I have to take the bus home from the airport, Dad,” she tells him, and he gasps on the other end of the phone. 

“You would deny me the pleasure of picking up my own daughter? On Christmas Eve? I think someone’s getting coal this year.”

“You should be thanking me,” she argues playfully. “Think about the traffic, the holiday travelers, the tinsel. Honestly, this should be the only present I have to get you.”

“Well, we’ll meet you at the school, then.”

“Yeah,” she riffs. “That won’t be weird. My dad, my stepmom, and my stepbrother, all coming to take me home.”

“Stepbrothers, actually,” her father mentions. “Darrell’s coming home this Christmas. He’s bringing Christina with him.”

“So, where would I be sitting, in this overcrowded car?”

“You’re right,” Keith finally agrees. “You can spurn your family and come home in your own time.”

“I’ve already made arrangements with Wallace,” she tells him. “I love you, Dad.”

She hears him cough. “I love you too.”

The next morning, she wakes up to news of an impending blizzard.

~~~

It’s a miserable two days as she waits anxiously for the snow to slow down enough for them all to get home.

She reorders her retribution list to put the school official who planned this trip in December in first place, dropping Wallace down to the bronze. Because, she reasons as she fogs up her window and draws snowflakes in the condensation, if she weren’t here Wallace would be. And that would mean Wallace would be missing Christmas. With Darrell. And that’s also unacceptable.

When the snow finally does stop, the amount of flights cancelled means they’ll miss Christmas altogether. And since drinking, let alone heavily, on a school trip is strictly prohibited, she chooses to utilize the hotel’s community kitchen instead.

She passes gaggles of students, who all appear to be wallowing on the lobby couches after spending the previous days frolicking in the snow, on her way out for the necessary baking supplies and then again on the way in. 

Aside from them, the hotel feels barren. She pulls on her newly acquired and cheap apron, and starts setting up her cookie making stations.

And shrieks as Logan Echolls appears in the doorway.

“What are you doing?” she snarls.

He rolls his eyes at her. “I’ve gotten tired of monitoring the teenage angst that is the lobby. What you’re doing looks a lot more interesting. So I switched out with your roommate and came to investigate.”

“You’re investigating me making cookies?”

“I was worried you were baking a cake. Where ‘cake’ would be code word for ‘bomb’.”

“Why are you here?”

“You seemed like you could use a little company. You’ve been quiet the last couple of days. Not your usual misanthropic self.” He pauses, oozing exaggerated worry. “I’m concerned.”

“Just go away, please.”

“Come on,” Logan says. “It’s Christmas, and we’re stuck in this hotel until probably New Years. You clearly have family you’re missing. So, keep doing what you’re doing, and I’ll help you.”

“You’re gonna help me?” she responds suspiciously, and he nods earnestly.

“Hell,” he answers, throwing his arms out wide, like he’s trying to hug the room, “I’ll even sing you Christmas carols if you need me to. I’ll be the very model of a modern kitchen sous chef.”

She cracks a grin. “They’re just snickerdoodles. I don’t know if they require a lot of sous cheffing.”

He shrugs. “It looks like you bought enough ingredients to feed an army. Why don’t we cook cookies until we either make enough for the 30 students on the trip, or run out of ingredients?”

“You bake cookies,” she corrects and he hops up on the counter and smirks like he’s won.

“Great, show me how.”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know,” he tells her. “But I’d rather be baking cookies with you than be in the lobby listening to how no one has suffered the way these kids are suffering, or holed up in my room with the guy whose cousin once boosted my car for spare parts.”

She stiffens. “That’s incredibly racist.”

“It would be,” Logan agrees, “if our esteemed colleague didn’t lord it over me that his cousin boosted my car for spare parts once. Apparently, I failed his kid. Now I know how the criminal element in that town works.”

Veronica giggles, and shakes her head. “How did Logan Echolls end up in Neptune, anyway?”

“How did you?” he snaps back.

She quiets, turns back to the kitchenette. “I got fired.”

It’s the first time she’s said it out loud. Wallace got it. Wallace figured it out pretty quickly, when she’d been flying high one moment and on his doorstep the next. But she’d always couched it in euphemisms before. She doesn’t know why she told Logan the unvarnished truth. She stares at the laminate, counting their eggs, calculating how many cookies they can make.

“Veronica…”

“No, it’s good,” she cuts him off. “I was a photojournalist. My dad - well, he was the sheriff, and I always wanted to do what he did. Making the world better. And I - I was cocky. I screwed up, and I got myself fired. And now,” she tells him, not turning to face him, “I work at the same high school I went to, when my goal was to end up anywhere else.”

For a moment, the room is quiet. 

Then -

“My dad killed my mom.” She turns quick enough that her neck snaps.

“I thought -”

“Yeah, no, a mixture of vodka and quaaludes finished the job. But he was just - she was going to leave him. And the last fight they had, I don’t know. I just know that he killed her. Slowly. And I thought it was gonna happen to me too. It was going to happen to me too,” he emphasizes. “That’s the short version of how I ended up in Neptune.”

She stares at him. “What’s the long version?”

He looks at her through his eyelashes, and she takes a second to consider reordering her list of effective puppy dog eyes. “Let me help you bake cookies, and maybe we’ll get there.”

She considers him for a second, and then shakes her head. “Okay.”

He skips over.

He nods, and then leans forward. “I have a confession.”

“Okay.”

“I’ve never baked before.”

She smirks. “And you only ever ate whipped cream made fresh by some four star chef?”

“Of course not,” he tells her, looking scandalized. “I’m not a Vanderbilt. I’m Hollywood royalty. We get things like dairy products in pressurized cans.”

She can’t help but giggle at him, and then sets up his work station. She feels his eyes following her as she separates the pre-measured ingredients. “Now, I just need you to mix these three first until it’s fluffy, and then add the eggs.”

“I don’t know if food should be described as ‘fluffy’”, he mutters, but diligently follows her directions, beating the butter, vanilla, and sugar together more meticulously than she’s ever witnessed before. He even gently cracks the eggs in a separate bowl before adding them to the mixture.

“Why are you doing that?” she asks him, her curiosity piqued by his blush.

“I don’t know - it just seems safer to crack them and then add them. Is that wrong?”

“No,” she tells him. “It’s not wrong at all.”

She shakes her head, and goes back to her cookie baking duties, preheating the oven and washing and greasing the hotel’s ancient cookie sheets.

After they combine the ingredients and she shows him how much dough to ball up and put on the sheet, taking his first attempt from him and breaking it into smaller, more cookie-sized pieces.

“I think my giant balls would be a hit,” he tells her exuberantly, and she swallows her laugh and works up a glare. “You thought that was funny, I can tell.”

“Shut up and play with your balls,” she retorts, and he grins.

Holds his two smaller dough balls in his hands out to her. “Okay, what do I do now?”

“Now,” she says, grabbing his hands and plopping the first of the two cookies into the sugar and cinnamon mixture, “we roll these guys in here, getting them evenly coated.”

“You know this recipe by heart,” Logan says leadingly, and Veronica nods.

“I was on the pep squad for a while in high school,” she tells him. “And then, I wasn’t, but Wallace was the star player on the basketball team. So I’d sneak spirit boxes into his locker on game days.”

He smiles at her, wide and sincere, and she smiles back. “And you couldn’t just give them to him at home.”

“God, no. I was an anti-pep curmudgeon by that point. So cynical and over things like high school pride. Besides,” she tells him, placing their cookies on the sheet, “it was more fun for Wallace to get all excited about someone caring enough to do that for him.”

“He ever find out?”

“Oh, yeah,” she laughs. “I was finishing up a batch when he came home from practice early one day and started snacking on the makings of his spirit box. He figured it out pretty quickly, after he was done burning his mouth on ill-gotten cookies.”

“It would have been great to have a sister like you in high school,” he tells her. “I didn’t get the good sibling experience until after, when I met my brother.”

“I heard something about that,” she mutters, and he raises his eyebrow. “Hey, you were hot stuff in Neptune. Your picture graced more than a few girls’ lockers. And I swear, no one can avoid celebrity news.”

“Yeah, well, Charlie’s how I ended up in Neptune.” She nods at him to continue as she prepares the next batch, and he starts manually mixing ingredients again. “He’s a teacher. And when we met, after a bit of a snafu, he told me that I had to get my shit together. So, I did. And, I don’t know, I figured I’d follow in his footsteps. He seemed to be the one good Echolls, so…”

She watches him shuffle a little bit. “I don’t know. You don’t seem half bad yourself.”

“Yeah? That’s a fairly recent change of opinion. I think you described me as a ‘prettyboy partier who doesn’t take anything seriously’.”

She flushes. “I did mention that I was a curmudgeon, right? That didn’t go away after high school. It’s now an ingrained part of my personality.” 

“So I shouldn’t take offense?”

“Well, you are a pretty boy,” she tells him. “Look at your hair. You probably spend more time on that than I do in the morning.”

“I’ll shave it all off tonight,” he promises, and she shakes her head.

“No, you can stay a pretty boy.”

“Really?” he asks, leaning into her space. She doesn’t back away. “So, you like pretty boys.”

She turns toward the baking station. “Not usually, no. I’ve been known to make an exception, though. From time to time.”

“Good to know.”

They work in silence for a few minutes, pausing in their cookie making for Veronica to pull out the first batch to cool. Logan leans back on the counter, and nodding toward the camera peeking out of her bag, asks, “Photojournalist, huh? Like, real photojournalism, or paparazzi stuff?”

“If I were ever a paparazzi, I could have gotten back in the biz by selling pics of you slow dancing with minors,” she slings back as she throws some flour at him. He gapes at her, flour clinging to his hair and sweater. “I covered the real news, thank you very much.”

“I can’t believe you did that.”

“Believe it, buddy,” she starts to say, before he grabs the box of baking soda and shakes it at her. The slightly bitter taste invades her mouth, and he starts laughing.

“That’s a good look for you.”

“Yeah? You too.” She grabs her phone out of her back pocket takes a few rapid shots. “I’m going to actually have to accept your friend request just to tag you in these puppies.”

“Hey,” he says, “that request was sent in jest. You’re not supposed to seriously consider accepting it.”

She lets her face drop into a pout. “And here I thought we’d bonded.”

His eyes shine. “Okay, how about a couple of selfies then?”

She finds herself pressed firmly against his side, his arm a pleasant weight around her waist.

Two white powdered and smiling faces are illuminated back at her when she flips through the photos.

“You don’t want to use your actual camera?”

She doesn’t stiffen. It surprises her, how much this conversation isn’t making her yearn to flee. “I haven’t used my camera for 2 years, until this trip.”

She still took it everywhere for those two years. Still shoved it in every bag and suitcase. She doesn’t let herself think about why. 

“Because you -”

“Yeah.” She shrugs. “It was just - I was a disappointment. And it’s the reminder of that. That I couldn’t make it.”

“You’re making it now,” he offers. “You could maybe even offer a photography class as an elective.”

“Ah, yes,” she tells him, mouth turning downward. “So I can be witness to the next generation of photographers. Those who can’t, teach, right?”

He quiets. “Or, you can accept that you’re good at teaching, and that you can have permission to enjoy it.”

“Yeah?”

He shrugs. “It’s what I did.” Throws her a lopsided grin. “How long do we need to wait before we start packing these guys up?”

“I’d give them 30 minutes or so.”

“Cool. I’m going to go out and find something to put them in.” He shuffles a bit more. Gives her an ever-so-slight head tilt. She recognizes it. “Want to help?”

“Yeah,” she tells him. “I’ll come with you. Maybe we can get some cellophane and ribbons. Make it Christmasy.”

He helps her into her coat, and she tries to bite back the smile that erupts from that one action. 

~~~

They amble down the sidewalk, side by side, Logan occasionally directing her around the puddles she still can’t figure out how to avoid, when they pass a park where there is a full on snowball fight. The wickedest smile stretches across Echolls’ face.

“Logan,” she warns, “no.”

His eyes gleam, and he takes a step away from her. She shakes her head and backs away, laughing a little bit. “No.”

He picks up some snow, and she turns and runs around the corner, Logan following closely. The first snow ball whizzes past her head, and she allows herself a sigh of relief. The next one hits her square between the shoulder blades. She stops, and turns slowly, listening to Logan’s giggles.

“You just made a big mistake.”

She grabs a mound of snow, and makes a ball, flinging it at him. It breaks apart before it reaches his target.

“Wintered in Colorado,” he gleefully announces, “for years. And while I never understood the appeal of skiing, I do know how to make snowballs.”

He throws another one at her. She dodges, and grabs more snow. Packs it more firmly.

“I’ll figure this out.” Flings it off, and it goes wide. “I will.”

“Sure,” he says, packing another snowball and hitting her. “By March, you should have this down.”

She makes another one, and fakes a throw. Logan darts, and she releases. It smacks him in the arm, and she whoops. He starts laughing.

By the time they find a store selling the supplies they need, they’re both soaked. He winds one arm through hers, and pulls her close. She closes her eyes as he kisses her softly.

“Merry Christmas, Veronica.”

“Merry Christmas.”

~~~

They hand out their wrapped cookies to the kids, with the additional news that their flight has finally been rescheduled for 6:14 AM the next morning.

“Meaning,” Veronica tells them all sternly, “we have to be in the lobby by 3 AM. At the latest.”

The students nod at them distractedly, trying to unknot their cookies.

“Maybe we should have told them, and then given them the snacks,” Logan muses, and Veronica nods in agreement.

“Next time,” she says absently, and he grins at her.

“It’s a date.” She blinks at him, and he brings a hand up to the back of his head, rubs it a few times. “I mean, if you want. If you don’t -”

“No,” she cuts him off. “A date. It would be nice. Once we’re back on the west coast and I have clothes that match the weather.”

~~~

The chaperones start knocking on the student doors at 2:30. She notices that Logan hasn’t done his hair. It’s smashed on one side and sticking up on the other. She bites her lip and resists the urge to ruffle it.

They’re separated for the plane ride home, a direct flight, thank god, but he sneaks in next to her as she waits in line for the buses back.

“Public transportation is so overrated,” he comments, and she snorts.

“Of course you would think that.”

He bumps her. “Are you saying you wouldn’t want a ride back to your car?”

“My car’s at my house,” she tells him. “Wallace dropped me off. And he’s supposed to pick me up.”

“What I’m hearing is - you want to take the bus.”

“I think we’re taking the bus, because it’s the requirement, and because I feel the way about taxis the way you feel about buses.”

He shrugs. “I’m not taking the bus back, because I didn’t take the bus here. I drove my car. And I think we’ve done enough for these kids. It’s time to let them leave the nest. Spread their wings. Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. Come on. You can call Wallace and tell him there’s been a change of plans. It’ll be door to door service. I’ll even carry your suitcase to the door.”

She watches his hand start to reach for the back of his neck. His feet shuffle the tiniest bit. She smiles at him, and swivels her suitcase, giving him the handle. “Alright. You can drive me to my dad’s.”

“Your dad’s?”

“Yeah,” she tells him as he walks her to his car. “Christmas comes but once a year, unless his daughter gets trapped in DC due to snow. Then it happens twice.”

He laughs. “Good to know.”

~~~

Logan’s car is one of the things she hated about him. The car, and the fact that - like most other BMW drivers - he seemed to feel like he had special rights.

Like not taking the bus to or from the airport.

Now, though, as they drive with the top down and the warm air dancing over her arms, she might consider it one of his selling points. There are no screaming kids, no harsh bumps. Just her, and him, and the sounds of A Charlie Brown Christmas gently permeating the car.

She watches him drive, coat off and flung into the backseat, held down by his duffle bag and her suitcase. Lets herself enjoy the moment. She pulls her camera out of her carry on, and focuses the lens.

“Still covertly taking pictures of me?” he asks, giving her a long, sideways glance.

She tsks. “No. This wasn’t covert. This is outward admiration. And when did I take covert pictures of you?”

He chuckles. “At the hotel. In the lobby. When we were at the National Mall, when I was with some students. I assume some other times, too. Hey, it’s okay. I’m a good looking guy. I would have been shocked if you weren’t sneaking pictures.”

“Yeah, yeah. I may have taken a few shots of you, when I was taking pictures of other people and things. Don’t get a big head about it.”

“Oh, I won’t,” he assures her. “I don’t think you’ll ever let me get a big head. I mean, you called my car the dickmobile. Which, I’d thought was a compliment until I got to know you.”

“You are a dick,” she tells him, unrepentant. “And your car is the first giant red light alerting people to that fact.”

“So, your opinion hasn’t changed?”

“No,” she tells him. “But I have it on good authority that I’m a bit prickly, so being a dick’s not necessarily a bad thing.”

“Who told you that?” 

“A couple of exes,” she says breezily. “Though one of them used the words ‘cold hearted bitch’ instead. I think he was over exaggerating.”

He grins, and slows down the car. “This the place?”

“Home sweet home,” she says, gazing at the bungalow. Unbuckles, leans over. “You could come in, if you wanted.”

He brushes her hair back behind her ear. “Thanks for the offer, but I think I’ll let your family have you to themselves for your Christmas.” 

She leans in a little further, whispers “okay” against his lips, and kisses him. Pulls away before he can deepen it. “Thanks for the ride. I’ll grab my bag.”

“I promised you door to door service,” he says, opening his car door. “I’m bringing your suitcase to the front steps.”

She slings her carry on over her shoulder, and her camera on top of that. He pulls out her suitcase and extends the handles, and reaches for her hand as he wheels it up the walkway. Parks it on the porch. 

“I guess I’ll see you Monday.”

“Yeah,” she tells him, and kisses him once more. “Or we could plan our date for a little sooner than that.”

He rests his forehead on hers, then leans back and untangles his fingers from hers. “I’ll call you later.”

She watches him make his way back down to his car, and finally opens the door to the house.

“VERONICA!” Four different voices cry. She grins.

~~~

Later, after the ‘real’ Christmas celebration is winding down, she and Wallace start on the dishes.

“So I thought I saw Logan Echolls drop you off,” he starts casually. “And then I thought I saw you kiss him. And then I thought I had a stroke, because neither of those things would happen in this real world.”

“Both of those things did happen, yes,” she tells him, and he gasps. “You’re the accidental matchmaker, here, by the way. If I didn’t take your spot, I could have happily hated him for the rest of my natural born life. And how did your date go?”

His smile grows wide. “It was alright. I may have had a couple of more since that first one. And don’t think I didn’t notice you putting all this on me. I never told you to canoodle with that guy.”

“No,” she agrees. “You just forced me to go on a trip where I would be in close proximity with him, and then when I got trapped there by snow and feeling homesick, ended up baking your favorite cookies with him.”

“Wait,” Wallace drags out. “You made snickerdoodles? And I didn’t get any?”

Veronica pulls out her camera, captures Wallace’s disgruntled face. Grins.


End file.
